Located at the Sears Centre in Hoffman Estates, Illinois, TNA held its forth annual "Bound for Glory" event. The "Bound for Glory" event was marked as an equivalent to the WWE's biggest show of the year "Wrestlemania". There were eight matches on the card and one dark match that was not televised. Of those eight matches four were for titles. Chicago was chosen as the city of the event by defeating New York City and Toronto as possible locations to where the event was to be held. Originally Samoa Joe was face Kevin Nash for TNA World Champion, but management decided on instead have the legendary Sting face him instead. Hardcore legend Mick Foley was recently signed with the company at the time was appointed a special guest referee for a match between Jeff Jarrett vs. Kurt Angle. He was supposed to replace former NFL player and WCW wrestler Steve McMichael as the special guest referee, but TNA decided that was going to have a part at some point during the event due to his years he's spent with the Chicago Bears.
Prior to the event, several TNA wrestlers dressed up as gangsters to promote this event which to me felt a bit offensive, but to them they were paying homage to the gangsters that were prominent figures during the 1920's and 1930's. Samoa Joe and LAX shot video packages to promote the event.
The hosts for the event were Mike Tenay and the recently deceased Don West. Jeremy Borash and David Penzer were the ring announcers. Earl Hebner, Mark "Slick" Johnson, and Traci Brooks were the more notable referees for the match and Steve McMichael and Mick Foley were special guest referees for two of the matches on the card. Jeremy Borash and Lauren Thompson were the backstage interviewers during the event.
Dark Match: Intergender Tag Team Match Eric Young and Sojournor Holt vs. Lance Rock and Christy Hemme. There isn't much to talk about this match being that it was pretelevised. Young and Holt were the winners, but Eric's night was not over yet as his alter-ego a Hurrican Helms superhero rip-off gimmick was in place for him in the opening match of the night.
Steel Asylum Match where the winner is the #1 contender for the TNA X-Division Championship featured Alex Shelley, Jay Lethal, Curry Man, Chris Sabin, Sonjay Dutt, Jimmy Rave, Johnny Devine, Petey Williams, Shark Boy and Super Eric. The way to win the match is the first wrestler to escape the domed cage which was built very similar to WCW's Thunderdome. The problem with this match was that there were way too many participants involved and more or less the cage was not really used to its fullest capacity. There were way too many spot fests and it took quite a while before someone tried to escape the cage. If I'm trying to be positive it was a good way to kick off the evening like you would expect at a major event like Wrestlemania or Starrcade. And it did its job to get the crowd excited. But it was in the end just a great big cluster of wrestlers that didn't have any real storied feud except Lethal and Sonjay. Therefore I give it only two stars. Lethal wins the match by escape and unintentional help from his rival, Sonjay.
We get a backstage segment with Jim Cornette, Mick Foley as he tells a sexy story to Stan Lane and Cornette who very busy assigns Foley to watch the office until he gets back. And then on with the next match.
Bimbo Brawl Match: ODB, Rhakka Khan and Rhino vs. The Beautiful People and Cute Kip (Billy Gunn) Traci Brooks was assigned special referee for this match, it's still a traditional one fall six-person tag match. This match was quite messy as there were a lot of botches and miscues. However the biggest mistake come when Velvet Sky pie-faces Rhino. Did she learn anything from ECW? Rhino doesn't care about male's being violent with females. He once piledrove The Sandman's wife through a table and swore back at her. This match deserves one star as there was no real payback, just filler. Rhino pins Kip after his signiture move, the gore.
X-Division Championship Match: Shiek Abdul Bashir (c) vs. Consequences Creed (Xavier Woods) This shows how classy wrestling could be as Bashir's gimmick was to expunge all the anti-Arab hatred American are especially after the Gulf War from the early 1990's (mind you he's an American from Minnesota). It feels like something Hulk Hogan pulled off over a decade and a half ago by taking a real war making it into an angle. They went far to bring a real Iraqi war veteran to announce Creed. The match itself was fine as it felt like watching a WWE style match and both men can work well together, but it was still very meh to say the least. Creed wins with a surprise roll up for the win and is the new X-Division champion. It the xenophobic foreign heel gimmick idea that ruined it all and this type of gimmick needs to stop. I give it two stars. Backstage we see Mick Foley talk about King of the Ring 98 and Awesome Kong walks in and says, "it doesn't matter" and Foley lectures her about gimmick infringement on it. To help cheer them up Foley calls out Yurple the Clown.
Triple Threat Match TNA Knockouts Champion: Taylor Wilde vs. Awesome Kong, vs. Roxxi. Kong as always looks like monster and TNA always ensured that if Kong gets defeated, it's never done fairly. It's a shame that this match lasted only five minutes, but there were some good highlights including Kong with her size and all delivering a crossbody on both Wilde and Roxxi. Roxxi tries to go for her finish but was met with a German suplex and Taylor Wilde keeps her title. It wasn't a bad match and Wilde shows she has greatness in spite of her in ring limitations. I give it 2 and a half stars. But then Kong would beat Wilde two weeks later for the belt. Backstage AJ Styles tells Foley he likes him and not the rest from the "other company". Brother Ray calls AJ a mark and Jim Cornette says that he's assigned referee for a match later on.
Monster's Ball Match For the TNA Tag Team Belts. Beer Money (James Storm and Bobby Roode) vs. Matt Morgan and Abyss vs. Team 3D (Brother Ray and Brother Devon) vs. LAX (Hernandez and Homicide) with special gust referee former Chicago Bear Steve McMichael. It's basically a fatal four way match with weapons highly encouraged and the first team to get the fall be it pin or submission is the winner. Unlike the opener where really nothing exciting happens here this match was awesome. It was violent, bloody and lots of sickening spots here. Including Abyss getting thrown through a flaming table, James Storm wants to football off with Steve McMichael, bad idea but some nice heel heat. The turning point came when Hernandez tried but failed to open a bag of thumbtacks but failed but was treated to a 3D, but Beer Money take the win and remain the champions. This match deserves 3 and a half stars.
Triple Threat Match: Booker T vs. Christian Cage vs. AJ Styles. It seems that TNA was really going for Booker T to win in this contest, however, the fans are more cheering for AJ. The reason why is because his the face of the company and that Booker might have had a few years left of him back then lost his appeal since leaving WWE and the King Booker gimmick. The fans were also tired out after that energetic violent match they witnessed before, but there was still enough to get them to root for AJ. Styles looked good in the match while Booker and Christian just phoned in WWE style match in the ring. The match ends when Christian goes for the unprettier, but Booker axe kicks Christian for the win. This match gets 2 and a half stars because AJ turned in the best performance here, but TNA chose Booker instead to get the win. Backstage Kurt Angle is unsure of Mick Foley officiating the match feeling that he will show bias towards Jeff Jarrett. Meanwhile Jarrett cuts a promo dedicating this match to his kids.
Kurt Angle vs. Jeff Jarrett (Special Guest Referee Mick Foley). Both Angle and Jarrett are at their a-game here as any move that Angle performs looks like a finisher whether it's suplex or a submission hold. But Jarrett can strike when he can and Angle has great ring psychology whenever he's in the ring. Jarrett breaks the anklelock and then a ref bump and Foley comes in. The turning point came when Foley encouraged Angle to hit him. Both he and Jarrett get chaired. Foley no sells the move, he pulls out Mr. Socko and applies the Mandible Claw on Angle another equalizer on an acoustic guitar and Jarrett wins. This gets four stars because it was good until the booking had to intervene.
TNA World Title Match: Samoa Joe (c) vs. Sting. The only gripe Sting has with Joe is that he doesn't respect him and wants to beat him to earn that respect. There was a mixed reaction from the fans. Such highlights including Sting and Samoa Joe are fighting in the crowd and Joe does an insane dropkick from out of a box and onto the steps where Sting was standing. Joe was quite dominant in his match against this legend. Sting feels weak and vulnerable like was when he fought Vader in 1992. Sting's attempt at a comeback are poorly executed. Sting gets some offense while Joe looks like an idiot. The match ends when Sting tries to get the bat, Kevin Nash takes the bat while the ref is out cold temporarily after a bump and hits Joe. Sting applies the Scorpion Deathlock for the win and the new TNA Champion. It gets 2 and a half stars because it showed promise until the genius booking came along the mess it up quickly.
Overall I gave this a five out of ten star rating here. They made bad decisions on who to put over by making veterans like Sting be the champion who at that time was very well past his prime. Franchise players like AJ Styles jobbing out to Booker T was disgracful to guy dedicated to this promotion. And finally Kurt Angle being defeated by Jarrett with Mick Foley's help makes thing I'm just rewatching a WCW reboot. Such a shame for your biggest show of the year.
Prior to the event, several TNA wrestlers dressed up as gangsters to promote this event which to me felt a bit offensive, but to them they were paying homage to the gangsters that were prominent figures during the 1920's and 1930's. Samoa Joe and LAX shot video packages to promote the event.
The hosts for the event were Mike Tenay and the recently deceased Don West. Jeremy Borash and David Penzer were the ring announcers. Earl Hebner, Mark "Slick" Johnson, and Traci Brooks were the more notable referees for the match and Steve McMichael and Mick Foley were special guest referees for two of the matches on the card. Jeremy Borash and Lauren Thompson were the backstage interviewers during the event.
Dark Match: Intergender Tag Team Match Eric Young and Sojournor Holt vs. Lance Rock and Christy Hemme. There isn't much to talk about this match being that it was pretelevised. Young and Holt were the winners, but Eric's night was not over yet as his alter-ego a Hurrican Helms superhero rip-off gimmick was in place for him in the opening match of the night.
Steel Asylum Match where the winner is the #1 contender for the TNA X-Division Championship featured Alex Shelley, Jay Lethal, Curry Man, Chris Sabin, Sonjay Dutt, Jimmy Rave, Johnny Devine, Petey Williams, Shark Boy and Super Eric. The way to win the match is the first wrestler to escape the domed cage which was built very similar to WCW's Thunderdome. The problem with this match was that there were way too many participants involved and more or less the cage was not really used to its fullest capacity. There were way too many spot fests and it took quite a while before someone tried to escape the cage. If I'm trying to be positive it was a good way to kick off the evening like you would expect at a major event like Wrestlemania or Starrcade. And it did its job to get the crowd excited. But it was in the end just a great big cluster of wrestlers that didn't have any real storied feud except Lethal and Sonjay. Therefore I give it only two stars. Lethal wins the match by escape and unintentional help from his rival, Sonjay.
We get a backstage segment with Jim Cornette, Mick Foley as he tells a sexy story to Stan Lane and Cornette who very busy assigns Foley to watch the office until he gets back. And then on with the next match.
Bimbo Brawl Match: ODB, Rhakka Khan and Rhino vs. The Beautiful People and Cute Kip (Billy Gunn) Traci Brooks was assigned special referee for this match, it's still a traditional one fall six-person tag match. This match was quite messy as there were a lot of botches and miscues. However the biggest mistake come when Velvet Sky pie-faces Rhino. Did she learn anything from ECW? Rhino doesn't care about male's being violent with females. He once piledrove The Sandman's wife through a table and swore back at her. This match deserves one star as there was no real payback, just filler. Rhino pins Kip after his signiture move, the gore.
X-Division Championship Match: Shiek Abdul Bashir (c) vs. Consequences Creed (Xavier Woods) This shows how classy wrestling could be as Bashir's gimmick was to expunge all the anti-Arab hatred American are especially after the Gulf War from the early 1990's (mind you he's an American from Minnesota). It feels like something Hulk Hogan pulled off over a decade and a half ago by taking a real war making it into an angle. They went far to bring a real Iraqi war veteran to announce Creed. The match itself was fine as it felt like watching a WWE style match and both men can work well together, but it was still very meh to say the least. Creed wins with a surprise roll up for the win and is the new X-Division champion. It the xenophobic foreign heel gimmick idea that ruined it all and this type of gimmick needs to stop. I give it two stars. Backstage we see Mick Foley talk about King of the Ring 98 and Awesome Kong walks in and says, "it doesn't matter" and Foley lectures her about gimmick infringement on it. To help cheer them up Foley calls out Yurple the Clown.
Triple Threat Match TNA Knockouts Champion: Taylor Wilde vs. Awesome Kong, vs. Roxxi. Kong as always looks like monster and TNA always ensured that if Kong gets defeated, it's never done fairly. It's a shame that this match lasted only five minutes, but there were some good highlights including Kong with her size and all delivering a crossbody on both Wilde and Roxxi. Roxxi tries to go for her finish but was met with a German suplex and Taylor Wilde keeps her title. It wasn't a bad match and Wilde shows she has greatness in spite of her in ring limitations. I give it 2 and a half stars. But then Kong would beat Wilde two weeks later for the belt. Backstage AJ Styles tells Foley he likes him and not the rest from the "other company". Brother Ray calls AJ a mark and Jim Cornette says that he's assigned referee for a match later on.
Monster's Ball Match For the TNA Tag Team Belts. Beer Money (James Storm and Bobby Roode) vs. Matt Morgan and Abyss vs. Team 3D (Brother Ray and Brother Devon) vs. LAX (Hernandez and Homicide) with special gust referee former Chicago Bear Steve McMichael. It's basically a fatal four way match with weapons highly encouraged and the first team to get the fall be it pin or submission is the winner. Unlike the opener where really nothing exciting happens here this match was awesome. It was violent, bloody and lots of sickening spots here. Including Abyss getting thrown through a flaming table, James Storm wants to football off with Steve McMichael, bad idea but some nice heel heat. The turning point came when Hernandez tried but failed to open a bag of thumbtacks but failed but was treated to a 3D, but Beer Money take the win and remain the champions. This match deserves 3 and a half stars.
Triple Threat Match: Booker T vs. Christian Cage vs. AJ Styles. It seems that TNA was really going for Booker T to win in this contest, however, the fans are more cheering for AJ. The reason why is because his the face of the company and that Booker might have had a few years left of him back then lost his appeal since leaving WWE and the King Booker gimmick. The fans were also tired out after that energetic violent match they witnessed before, but there was still enough to get them to root for AJ. Styles looked good in the match while Booker and Christian just phoned in WWE style match in the ring. The match ends when Christian goes for the unprettier, but Booker axe kicks Christian for the win. This match gets 2 and a half stars because AJ turned in the best performance here, but TNA chose Booker instead to get the win. Backstage Kurt Angle is unsure of Mick Foley officiating the match feeling that he will show bias towards Jeff Jarrett. Meanwhile Jarrett cuts a promo dedicating this match to his kids.
Kurt Angle vs. Jeff Jarrett (Special Guest Referee Mick Foley). Both Angle and Jarrett are at their a-game here as any move that Angle performs looks like a finisher whether it's suplex or a submission hold. But Jarrett can strike when he can and Angle has great ring psychology whenever he's in the ring. Jarrett breaks the anklelock and then a ref bump and Foley comes in. The turning point came when Foley encouraged Angle to hit him. Both he and Jarrett get chaired. Foley no sells the move, he pulls out Mr. Socko and applies the Mandible Claw on Angle another equalizer on an acoustic guitar and Jarrett wins. This gets four stars because it was good until the booking had to intervene.
TNA World Title Match: Samoa Joe (c) vs. Sting. The only gripe Sting has with Joe is that he doesn't respect him and wants to beat him to earn that respect. There was a mixed reaction from the fans. Such highlights including Sting and Samoa Joe are fighting in the crowd and Joe does an insane dropkick from out of a box and onto the steps where Sting was standing. Joe was quite dominant in his match against this legend. Sting feels weak and vulnerable like was when he fought Vader in 1992. Sting's attempt at a comeback are poorly executed. Sting gets some offense while Joe looks like an idiot. The match ends when Sting tries to get the bat, Kevin Nash takes the bat while the ref is out cold temporarily after a bump and hits Joe. Sting applies the Scorpion Deathlock for the win and the new TNA Champion. It gets 2 and a half stars because it showed promise until the genius booking came along the mess it up quickly.
Overall I gave this a five out of ten star rating here. They made bad decisions on who to put over by making veterans like Sting be the champion who at that time was very well past his prime. Franchise players like AJ Styles jobbing out to Booker T was disgracful to guy dedicated to this promotion. And finally Kurt Angle being defeated by Jarrett with Mick Foley's help makes thing I'm just rewatching a WCW reboot. Such a shame for your biggest show of the year.
